Los Angeles (CNN) -- Sirhan Sirhan, convicted of the 1968 assassination of presidential candidate Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, should be freed from prison or granted a new trial based on "formidable evidence" asserting his innocence and "horrendous violations" of his rights, defense attorneys said in federal court papers filed this week.

In a U.S. District Court brief, Sirhan's lawyers also say that an expert analysis of recently uncovered evidence shows two guns were fired in the assassination and that Sirhan's revolver was not the gun that shot Kennedy.

Attorneys William F. Pepper and Laurie D. Dusek also allege that fraud was committed in Sirhan's 1969 trial when the court allowed a substitute bullet to be admitted as evidence for a real bullet removed from Kennedy's neck.

The attorneys further assert that Sirhan was hypno-programmed to be a diversion for the real assassin and allege that Sirhan would be easily blamed for the assassination because he is an Arab. Sirhan, 67, is a Christian Palestinian born in Jerusalem whose parents brought him and his siblings to America in the 1950s.

Sirhan "was an involuntary participant in the crimes being committed because he was subjected to sophisticated hypno programming and memory implantation techniques which rendered him unable to consciously control his thoughts and actions at the time the crimes were being committed," court papers said.

Court papers filed by Sirhan's attorneys say the state "refuses to acknowledge that hypno programming/mind control is not fiction but reality and has been used for years by the U.S. military, Central Intelligence Agency and other covert organizations.

"Though the practices of hypno programming/mind control is hardly new, the public has been shielded from the darker side of the practice. The average person is unaware that hypnosis can and is used to induct antisocial conduct in humans," Sirhan's court filings say.

Pepper and Dusek represented Sirhan earlier this year in his unsuccessful request for parole from Pleasant Valley State Prison in Coalinga, California, 200 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles. He is serving a life sentence.

Sirhan was convicted of killing Kennedy and wounding five other people during the June 5, 1968, shooting inside the kitchen service pantry of the former Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Three bullets struck Kennedy's body while a fourth bullet passed harmlessly through the shoulder of his suit coat. Kennedy, the most seriously wounded of the six victims, died the next day. The other five people survived their wounds.

The substitute bullet was introduced in the trial as the actual bullet removed from Kennedy's neck and alleged to have been matched to Sirhan's gun, Pepper said.

Pepper and Dusek are requesting a hearing to present dramatic new findings that they say show a kitchen crossfire in the hotel.More...

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" Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." - Daniel Moynihan

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 27 (UPI) -- Lawyers for the man convicted in the 1968 assassination of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy in Los Angeles say their client should be freed because he is innocent.

Sirhan Sirhan, 67, is serving a life sentence at Pleasant Valley State Prison in Coalinga, Calif., for the shooting. Attorneys William F. Pepper and Laurie D. Dusek say Sirhan was hypnotically influenced to fire shots at the senator as a diversion while the real gunman fired from another spot at the former Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, CNN reported Saturday. More...

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" Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." - Daniel Moynihan

Los Angeles (CNN) -- If there was a second gunman in Sen. Robert F. Kennedy's assassination, who was it?

Lawyers for convicted assassin Sirhan Sirhan claim their client did not fire any of the gunshots that struck the presidential candidate in 1968. And in their latest federal court filing, they also rule out another man some have considered a suspect -- a private security guard named Thane Eugene Cesar, who was escorting Kennedy at the time he was shot.

Attorneys William Pepper and Laurie Dusek insist someone other than their client, Sirhan, fatally shot Kennedy. They now say the real killer was not Cesar, a part-time uniformed officer long suspected by some conspiracy theorists of playing a sinister role in the senator's murder.

Pepper and Dusek made the claim in papers submitted to a U.S. District Court in Los Angeles late last month. ::snipping2::Pepper and Dusek are trying to win Sirhan immediate freedom or a new trial based on what they call "formidable evidence" of his innocence and "horrendous violations" of his rights. The New York attorneys argue that two guns were fired in the assassination, that Sirhan's revolver was not the gun that shot Kennedy and that Sirhan was not responsible for his actions at the Ambassador.

Instead, the defense lawyers insist conspirators programmed Sirhan through hypnosis to fire shots as a diversion for the real assassin in Kennedy's murder.More...

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" Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." - Daniel Moynihan